


A Bloody Great Hot Flying Thing

by lady_ragnell



Series: Metaphor of Human Bloody Existence [3]
Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, M/M, Plot What Plot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-01-04
Updated: 2012-01-04
Packaged: 2017-10-28 22:51:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,452
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/313044
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lady_ragnell/pseuds/lady_ragnell
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Arthur's thinking about getting a tattoo, and Merlin talks him out of it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Bloody Great Hot Flying Thing

**Author's Note:**

> Set several months after the first story. Once again, title from "Guards! Guards!" by Sir Terry Pratchett.

“I’ve been thinking,” Arthur says in bed one night, “about getting a tattoo.”

Merlin looks up from his book, trying to gauge if this is one of Arthur’s attempts at distracting him from what he’s doing or if he’s actually serious. Arthur has his arms crossed behind his head and he’s smiling at the ceiling, which isn’t much of a hint. “Why do you want a tattoo?”

“Commemorate the last few months, and all that.” Arthur waves a lazy hand, but he’s starting to look alarmingly sincere.

And it’s not like he thinks Arthur would look back with a tattoo. Actually, the thought of him with a nice Celtic knot or something is enough to make Merlin a little preemptively weak in the knees (good thing he’s laying down). It’s just that Arthur has questionable taste sometimes, and tattoos are quite permanent. “If you are planning on getting my name tattooed on your arse, I will break up with you. Just so you know.”

“You can’t break up with me, you love me and you know it, _Merlin_.”

“It would be for your own good. So what were you thinking of getting?”

Arthur reaches out to push up Merlin’s shirt and trace his fingers over his back. “I thought … a dragon, maybe? It sort of makes sense.”

Merlin realizes with some horror that Arthur is actually serious and that he clearly hasn’t thought through the implications of his suggestion, so he puts a bookmark in his book and twists around to look Arthur properly in the eye. “A dragon. Arthur, are you _serious_?”

“What’s wrong with it?”

For at least the hundredth time in the last five months, Merlin reminds himself that his boyfriend is not actually this thick. Arthur is quite intelligent. He just sometimes forgets about little things like magic, and the implications of it. “Where were you thinking of getting this dragon?” he asks, because sometimes it’s best to make Arthur figure these things out for himself. Also, Arthur’s face when he figures out the problem is going to be _priceless_.

“I was thinking … here, maybe,” says Arthur, patting his hand on his chest right over his heart, and there are all the things they don’t talk about much and Merlin can’t decide if he’d rather shake him or kiss him.

“Hmm,” he says instead, and puts his book down, because clearly he is not going to get any more reading done this evening. Then he leans over and fastens his mouth over Arthur’s left nipple, which makes Arthur flail so hard he nearly gives Merlin a head injury. After swirling his tongue around for a few moments and making Arthur groan, Merlin lifts his head up again. “Arthur. What do you think the dragon would _say_ when I did that?”

“You think it would--”

“Groceries, t-shirts, children’s toys, Gwaine’s bad drawings, that pendant of Morgana’s … come on, you’ve heard them all too. And you really think your tattoo wouldn’t?” Merlin kisses Arthur’s chest again. “It sounds smug enough whenever it sees us holding hands. Can you imagine the sex commentary?” He lowers his voice in his best imitation of the dragon. “Young warlock, surely you can do better than that. The young Pendragon is barely breathing hard!”

Arthur collapses laughing. “Well, the other option was my hip …”

And that’s too good an opening to resist. Merlin starts kissing his way down Arthur’s chest. “Young warlock,” he says between kisses, “I think your technique could use some work. Why are you going so slowly? The two of you have a _destiny_ , you don’t have to be coy.”

“Arsehole, don’t talk about the damn dragon while you’re seducing me,” says Arthur, but he’s laughing.

Merlin tosses the blanket down out of the way, and Arthur starts wiggling out of the boxers he wears to bed, correctly guessing where Merlin is heading. “You aren’t using your hands enough, young warlock,” he says, grinning against Arthur’s stomach when he laughs. “And God help us if we didn’t take his advice. He’d never let us hear the end of it. I’d come deliver your vegetables and all your groceries would judge me.”

Arthur’s trying to keep his laughter quiet, but his muscles are still jumping under Merlin’s mouth and fingers as he finally kicks off his boxers. “Knowing our luck Morgana would be in as well. She always knows when he’s talking to us.”

“At least he won’t talk to her.” Merlin starts running his fingers over Arthur, slow and easy. “Can you imagine? Between your tattoo and the groceries she would know all our secrets.”

“You have talked me out of the tattoo,” says Arthur, breath hitching. “You would never have sex with me again.”

“True,” agrees Merlin, and then licks Arthur’s cock, because he will freely admit that he’s a horrible tease where Arthur is concerned, mostly because it pisses Arthur off so much. “Can’t imagine doing this with commentary. From someone besides you, I mean.”

Before Arthur can say something sarcastic (Merlin can just feel him drawing breath to do it and decides that Arthur would much rather have sex than have something unpleasant and magical done to him), Merlin stops talking and goes to work. After months, he’s familiar with the taste and the feel and is starting to know exactly with spots make Arthur whimper and groan and make Gwaine throw things at the wall (that last being why Merlin is slowly clearing out one of Gaius’s larger sheds with the intention of converting it into a home, not that he’s told Arthur that yet).

It doesn’t take long to reduce Arthur to a mostly-incoherent mess. He isn’t begging--Merlin hasn’t managed that feat quite yet, but he’s working towards it--but he is swearing continuously and calling Merlin a cocktease, which usually means he’s close. So Merlin pulls off and grins up at him when Arthur gives him a wild-eyed glare. “Now just imagine if the dragon was watching _that_. ‘Young warlock, surely your gag reflex isn’t that sensitive!’”

“Oh God, shut up, you are a horrible person, why am I dating you? I will never get an erection again and it’s all your fault my father will never have grandchildren.”

Merlin hides his face in Arthur’s hip so he won’t laugh, because Arthur is actually serious. His sex-babble is always _hilarious_ , although he denies it all later. “Actually,” he says when he trusts his voice, “the fact that you and Morgana are both gay and would be terrible parents is why your father will never have grandchildren.”

“ _Merlin,_ ” Arthur whines, which is the closest he ever gets to begging. “Even the dragon would be calling you a bloody tease at this point, come _on_.”

“Clearly I haven’t killed your erection that badly,” says Merlin, and sucks Arthur as far down as he can manage. A few minutes later, after Arthur’s made a really hilarious noise, Gwaine pounds on the wall, probably just back from Freya’s room, and Arthur, the arse, actually pounds back, which makes Merlin laugh around Arthur’s cock, which sets off a veritable Rube Goldberg machine of sex antics, ending in Arthur coming while biting his fist and Merlin with come all through his hair from muffling his laughter at exactly the wrong point. “What do you think?” he asks when he manages to get his breathing under control. “Would the dragon have pointers to give?”

“Christ, you madman, come up here, there’s only one proven way to shut you up,” Arthur replies and hauls Merlin up to the head of the bed to kiss him and shove his pajama pants down.

Both of them are laughing so hard that it takes far too long to get Merlin off, and Merlin knows that in the morning Gwaine is going to give them suspicious _why-the-hell-are-you-two-talking-about-dragons-in-bed_ looks, but it doesn’t really matter as long as he gets to curl up next to Arthur afterwards and clean the mess up with a handy spell that’s been getting a lot of practice. “So I’ve talked you out of the tattoo, then?” he asks when they’re both about ready to drop off to sleep.

Arthur ruffles his hair. “Of the dragon, at least. I’ve got plenty to remember the last few months by anyway.” He sounds unabashedly fond then, and clears his throat after a second like he always does when anyone might have heard. Merlin grins into his neck and waits for whatever prattish comment comes next. “But still, perhaps a tattoo. There’s always the option of getting your name on my--”

The great thing about having magic is that Merlin can beat his boyfriend about the head with a pillow even when he’s too tired to move.


End file.
